Monday, January 20, 2014

J.T. Yost's Best Comics Of 2013

As is our annual tradition, we invited a number of our friends who are
also cartoonists, comics publishers and editors to tell us what their
favorite comics of 2013 were. We'll be publishing them all over the next
few weeks.

Mr. Mom-ing for two kids doesn't leave me near enough time for reading comics, so my list will be comprised of comics that we distribute at Birdcage Bottom Books:

(in no particular order)

1. Jason Little's Borb series
This homage to classic newspaper strips like Gasoline Alley about a homeless alcoholic manages to be funny, moving and full of pathos. Gorgeous artwork throughout.

2. Marek Bennett's Slovakia: Fall in the Heart of Europe
Marek's
simply drawn anthropomorphic bunnies allow for such a huge range of
emotion in this huge collection of diary comics and stories. I knew
virtually nothing about Slovakia before reading this, and I feel like
I've been given a great primer on their history and outlook on life
through engaging personal anecdotes. Plus, it's possibly the best value
in our whole catalog at $20 for over 600 pages!

4. Jamie Vayda's Loud Comix series Jamie is most known for being in various punk bands, but he's decided to
commit to drawing with such a ferocity it's terrifying. His artwork is a
mash-up of Peter Bagge, hot rod art and punk sensibility, and he uses
it to great advantage in illustrating stories penned by southern punk
luminaries, stand-up comedians, foreign television writers and other
ne'er-do-wells. At first we were just going to distribute his comics but
were so taken with his talent that we've committed to publishing a new
32-page comic every two months!

5. Anuj Shrestha's Genus series
Anuj is so sweet and unassuming in person, I'm always surprised at what lurks in his subconscious. Genus has a Twilight Zone quality to it that is truly unsettling yet appealing. Plus, this guy can draw floral-headed people like nobody's business.

6. Sam Spina's Spinadoodles: Year Four (I'm Zonin')
I'm
a sucker for diary comics. I'll read them even if they're horrible.
Sam's are not horrible. Four times out of five they'll make me laugh
aloud, and I absolutely love his brushwork and character design (can you
call the way he draws people "character design"?).

7. Noah Van Sciver's Weekend Alone
Has
Noah Van Sciver ever not come through? No, even in his sketchbook,
lavishly reproduced in full-color here, he delivers. "Sketchbook" is a
little misleading since this collection contains many fully-formed
stories. There's one fake ad for Domino's Pizza that kills me every time
I look at it. This is an extremely limited edition not being sold in
retail stores (I don't think), but we're lucky enough to have a handful
of 'em in our web-store.

10. Victor Kerlow's Bad Party
Yet
another amazing collection of short comics. Victor seemingly never
stops drawing, and it's a compulsion for which I'm thankful. I'm less
thankful for his compulsion for wearing terrible baseball hats. Engaging
stories, a good sense of humor and fantastic artwork.